


Love Enduring

by MxTicketyBoo



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route Spoilers, M/M, Pining, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-17 04:41:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29094417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MxTicketyBoo/pseuds/MxTicketyBoo
Summary: Love, it turns out, is not a fragile emotion.---Ashe contemplates the wall separating his room from Dedue's and yearns for a future when they can be together.Written for the Ashe x Dedue Storybook Zine.
Relationships: Ashe Duran | Ashe Ubert/Dedue Molinaro
Comments: 4
Kudos: 19





	Love Enduring

“Well, this is me.” Ashe chuckles awkwardly and stops just in front of the door to his dorm room.

Dedue, who was striding in silence beside him, simply pauses and nods. “And that is me.” He inclines his head toward the door a bit farther down the pathway.

Ashe smiles up at him. “Yes.”

Such a relief, to be able to say that now, after all the time he spent thinking Dedue was gone. Such a comfort to have him back. Ashe is selfishly grateful to have him so near as well.

They’ve been on kitchen duty again, a responsibility the others happily leave to the two of them, knowing how much both Ashe and Dedue enjoy the task. Ashe can’t say he minds. He _does_ like cooking, but what he likes even more is preparing meals alongside Dedue. It doesn’t matter how humble or extravagant the fare. What he most enjoys is the company, putting their heads together to come up with creative ways to stretch limited resources into filling rations, sharing stories above the sounds of mixing and chopping, amid the familiar scents of herbs and spices. 

By now, walking back to the dormitories together has become a habit. These interludes, as inconsequential and mundane as they may outwardly seem, are the moments Ashe lives for. Anything to feel close to the man he’d missed so much, anything to be near him for another hour, another minute.

The night around them is cold, crisp, and quiet, most of the others either retired for the evening or shuttered in the war council room with the Professor. 

If he closes his eyes, Ashe can almost imagine they’re completely alone. What might they do, where might they go, he wonders, if Fódlan was at peace and they had all the time in the world, just the two of them? 

Then Dedue shifts, and Ashe flushes, realizing he’s been caught staring up at Dedue like a lovesick teenager.

He clears his throat. “I’d better get to bed. Early morning tomorrow.”

Dedue tips his chin. “Indeed. Pleasant dreams, Ashe.”

“You, too, Dedue.”

Ashe watches him walk away, admiring Dedue’s broad shoulders, muscular arms, the frost-white hair burnished silver by the moonlight. He’s so handsome he reduces Ashe to stammering sometimes—or dreamy sighing when he’s reading another adventurous tale and pictures Dedue as the valiant hero riding in to save the day, as he had at Myrddin. Ashe will never forget the sight of him appearing on that bridge, nor the way Dedue stepped in to save him from a well-aimed axe.

When Dedue reaches his own door, Ashe slips into his room, not wishing to be discovered daydreaming again.

He changes into his night clothes and settles at his desk to do some reading. Even now, with the nation at war, the Professor gives them assignments to keep their minds sharp. Ashe still has much to learn about military strategy. He fights because he must, because it’s his honor and duty to help defend Faerghus, and he’s dreamed of knighthood nearly all his life. One day, perhaps, he’ll kneel and pledge his fealty before a lord, but he’s not a natural soldier or tactician. The lessons he’s learned here—from Sir Gilbert, the Professor, and Duke Fraldarius—are invaluable to a commoner such as himself.

Tonight, however, the words keep blurring on the page.

Over and over again, Ashe finds his gaze drawn to the stone wall separating his room from Dedue’s.

Is Dedue studying, as Ashe is now? Is he already asleep, there in the room where he’d been a boy and now stood as a man full grown?

Five years is a long time. So much has changed, and yet, for Ashe, one vital fact remains.

Love, it turns out, is not a fragile emotion.

It endures—through war, through hunger, through death.

He’d loved Dedue as a boy, yearned for him in a way that confused him and left his heart aching.

Only after the attack on Garreg Mach and the time that followed did Ashe recognize that yearning for what it was.

Through all the years, even after learning Dedue had sacrificed himself to save his liege and believing his beloved dead, that feeling never extinguished. It burned low and hot like embers, merely waiting to be stoked to flames.

Since Dedue’s return, the love blazed into a roaring fire once more. Ashe feels it warming his stomach and boiling in his blood whenever they’re together… and Ashe knows, deep in his heart, the feelings are returned, though they remain unspoken. 

The proof is in the way their fingers brush, the fondness in Dedue’s eyes whenever their gazes meet, the soft, upturned curve of his mouth whenever Ashe makes a silly joke or brings him fresh spices from the market.

Ashe simply _knows_.

Abandoning the book and his chair, Ashe moves to the wall, presses his fingertips to the cool stone. He rests his forehead there, and spreads his palm flat. He wants to tear the wall apart brick by brick, break down this barrier between them until it crumbles to dust, though it’s far from the only obstacle barring their way. There’s a war to finish, and a continent to rebuild. If they win— _when_ they win—Ashe believes Duscur should be the first country to receive aid from the Kingdom.

Dedue, more than anyone, deserves to see his homeland thriving and brimming with life once again. The people of Duscur deserve to be vindicated, absolved of all wrongdoing. 

Ashe wants to be at Dedue’s side when that dream comes to fruition, and forever after that, if Dedue will have him.

“Dedue,” he whispers. His voice trembles with longing, and his heart thuds behind his rib cage, the heavy beat resounding in his ears. _I love you._

Later, when all of this is over, when Dedue has repaid his debt to His Majesty and their lives can truly begin, he’ll say those words aloud, too.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Comments and kudos are always very much appreciated! <3
> 
> Find me [on Twitter](https://twitter.com/MxTicketyBoo).


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